THE EXETER HALL FESTIVAL.
True representation of the first performance fully confirmed the jus- tice of those remarks which we offered last week as to the foolish and indiscriminate admission of singers into the orchestra. The managers of the Festival, after having puffed and paraded the "kind and gratuitous assistance" of some of these ladies and gentlemen, announced their names and their songs, and admitted a much larger number of auditors to the rehearsal (as it was called) than attended the performance, most unceremoniously threw them overboard, and omitted the songs to which their names were attached in the books. Their conduct was foolish at first, and afterwards cruel. A singer has no right to complain because she is not engaged ; but having been invited and announced, to be then capriciously rejected on account of a blunder committed by the managers, is an act of injustice which cannot be too severely condemned. The ladies announced for the following night's performance appear to have been less easily shaken off; and both they and the /gentlemen resolutely inflicted upon their audience, by way of prelude to Israel in Egypt, the following succession of songs, which a band of six hundred performers were compelled in idleness and listless- ness to hear,—" Angels ever bright," " Lord remember David," " 0 Liberty," "From mighty kings," " Gratias agimus," "Let the bright Seraphim," and such other threadbare airs, the refuse of old Covent Garden bills ; to all of which the company were most evidently reluctant and fatigued listeners. The only novelties in this act were a Chorus by Preeess,—scarcely worthy of being introduced into these perform. ances ; and SPHOR'S sublime Psalm, " Unendlicher Gott, unser Herr,"—the beauties of which were very imperfectly developed, and its true mode of performance not at all understood. There was another ridiculous peculiarity attendant on this medley act : nearly all the songs had the same character, and seemed to have been selected in order to display the instrumental and not the vocal performers ; for LINDLEY, WILLMAN, PLATT, and HARPER were, in succession, paraded before the audience, and, under pretence of listening to sacred music, we were treated to a succession of instrumental cadences. Let it not be said that these absurdities were perpetrated in obedience to the wishes and expectations of the audience : this was the plea of the Philharmonic Directors on a late memorable occasion ; but now, as then, it is the mere shuffling pretext for idleness, favouritism, or bad taste. It is an imputation which the audience practically refuted and rejected. The medley act was heard with every indication of in- difference, and no enthusiasm was felt or expressed till the com- mencement of the Oratorio.
Long before the revival of Israel in Egypt at the Abbey Festival, we had, in opposition to the received opinion, maintained its absolute supremacy over every other of its author's oratorios : and we apprehend that few competent judges, nay few ordinary hearers who enjoyed the privilege of hearing it on the present occasion, would now differ with us on this point. The subject is precisely fitted to the grasp of HANDEL'S mind, and calculated to call forth its power where it had no rival. It embodies all that is majestic, sublime, awful in choral writing, unmixed with a particle of feebleness. The successive inflictions of the Almighty's wrath are portrayed with appalling grandeur. The art of man exercised on the same subject would vainly endeavour to stir up all the emotions which HANDEL here excites : vainly would the poet or the painter strive with him for mastery, and feeble would be the proudest efforts of their art compared with his. No other subject
presents the same varied field for musical expression ; and the com- poser's success is uniform. Every chorus is a triumph. The more arduous the conflict, the more complete is his victory. The scene is never too great for him. His march is that of a giant, wielding all the elements of power with ease and freedom, and trampling on
every difficulty.: We confine ourselves here to the choral writing
of this oratorio ; for some of the songs and duets are so puny that they seem the work of another hand. This is to be regretted; and the feebleness and paucity of the songs has certainly operated against the performance of the work. An attempt was made at the Abbey Festival to supply this deficiency ; but it was a most lame and impotent one, and its absurdity having been then sufficiently exposed, it ought not to have been repeated. The words of the Oratorio are those of the Bible, and no other ought to be mixed up with them, especially such " base matter " as appears in this new ver-
sion. The music, too, introduced, isnot Handel's. The interpolations,
therefore, were altogether unsuitable and impertinent. But the double sin of incongruous interpolation and barbarous mutilation was corn- mated. The two parts of the Oratorio were cut down to one, in order to make room for the medley act : and the Chorus, " Moses and the children of Israel," (the connecting musical link between two pieces in C minor and A major,) as well as others omitted. These
absurdities, wherever perpetrated, whether at the Abbey, at York, or at Exeter Hall, it is our duty to expose and denounce. In due time
they will cease ; for it will no longer be safe to speculate on the igno- rance and credulity of the public. This duty, on the present occasion, is absolutely forced upon us by the indiscreet puffs with which the ar-
rangements of the Festival in general were heralded ; which (as far as these are concerned) have been the very opposite to what we had been led to expect.
We now tarn, gladly, to the real excellence of the Festival—its chorus-singing. The instrumental band, chiefly composed of amateurs, was comparatively feeble,—feeble, that is, for the number assembled ; the songs were for the most part unnecessary, and not 'infrequently dis- graceful intrusions ; but the choral shout was magnificent, and the training of this vocal army reflects the highest credit on Mr. Taavens. We shall not recount their triumphs in detail, although many instances of splendid choral effect might easily be selected, on which it would afford us pleasure to descant. It will be sufficient to say, that the true art of chorus-singing was more perfectly developed here than at any performance we ever heard; it was felt to be something more and
better than a mere stentorian exercise of the lungs. In the treble voices especially, there was a total absence of that noisy vulgarity by which chorus-singing is too often deformed.
The Messiah was performed on Thursday and Friday evenings ; and here also full justice was done to the choruses.
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